Edwy the Fair or the First Chronicle of Aescendune eBook

The sun arose in a bright and cloudless sky on the
following morning, and his first beams aroused every
sleeper in the hall of Aescendune from his couch of
straw, for softer material was seldom or never used
for repose. Even the chamber in which the prince
slept could not be called luxurious: the bed
was in a box-like recess; its coverlets, worked richly
by the fair hands of the ladies, who had little other
occupation, covered a mattress which even modern schoolboys
would call rough and uncomfortable.

The wind played with the tapestry which represented
the history of Joseph and his brethren, as it found
its way in through crevices in the ill-built walls.
There were two or three stools over which the thane’s
care for his guest had caused coverlets to be thrown;
a round table of rough construction stood like a tripod
on three legs, upon which stood the unwonted luxury
of ewer and basin, for most people had to perform
their ablutions at the nearest convenient well or spring.

Leaving this chamber in good time, Prince Edwy acompanied
his new friends to the priory church, where they heard
mass before the sun was high in the heavens, after
which they returned to the hall to take a light breakfast
before they sought the attractions of the chase in
the forest. Full of life they mounted their horses,
and galloped in the wild exuberance of animal spirits
with their dogs through the leafy arches of the forest,
startling the red deer, the wolf, or the wild boar.
Soon they roused a mighty individual of the latter
tribe, who turned to bay, when the boys dismounted
and finished the affair with their boar spears, not
without some personal danger, and the loss of a couple
of dogs.

Onward again they swept, past leafy glades of beech
trees, where the swineherd drove his half-tame charges,
or where the woodcutters plied their toil, and loaded
their rude carts or hand barrows with fuel for the
kitchen of the hall; past rookeries, where the birds
made the air lively by their noise; over brook, through
the half-dry marsh, until they came upon an old wolf;
whom they followed and slew for want of better game,
not without a desperate struggle, in which Elfric,
ever the foremost, got a much worse scratch than on
the preceding day.

But how enjoyable the sport was, how sweet to breathe
the bright pure air of that May day; how grand to
outstrip the wind over the yielding turf, and at last
to carry home the trophies of their prowess; the scalp
of the wolf, the tusks of the boar, leaving the serfs
to bring in the succulent flesh of the latter, while
the hawks and crows fed upon the former.

And then with what appetite they sat down to their
“noon meat,” taken, however, at the late
hour of three, after which they wandered down to the
river and angled for the trout which abounded in the
clear stream.

The youthful reader will not wonder that such attractions
sufficed to detain Edwy several days, during which
he was continually hunting in the adjacent forests,
always attended by Elfric, and sometimes by Alfred.
To the elder brother he seemed to have conceived a
real liking, and expressed great reluctance to part
with him.